Political dissidents and former prisoners of conscience in Cuba support ending U.S. travel ban:

• Yoani Sanchez, a leading Cuban blogger subject to harassment for her critical views: “…I support an immediate opening to allow all Americans to travel to Cuba, the end of the “blockade,” the end of the damaging hostilities of the Cold War, and in particular the complete elimination of anything that limits contact between the citizens of both countries.
   
• Marta Beatriz Roque, a former political prisoner and president of the Assembly to Promote Civil Society: “I think everyone should have the freedom to travel, which is something that the Cuban people lack. So if we’re fighting here for democracy, how can we try to restrict the freedom of the American people?”
   
• Miriam Leiva, an independent journalist and co-founder of the Ladies in White, and her husband Oscar Espinosa, an independent economist and former political prisoner: “We fully support lifting all restrictions on Americans to travel to Cuba . . . Even by a simple conversation, sharing everyday experiences, Americans would be demonstrating how your society is capable of constantly deepening and improving democracy, and could help our own efforts for democracy.”
   
• Vladimiro Roca, leader of the opposition Cuban Social-Democratic Party, and Elizardo Sanchez, founder of the Cuban Human Rights and National Reconciliation Committee, both of whom have spent years in Cuban prisons: “Just as we insist on the right of Cubans to travel, to leave and return to our country freely, a right now denied us, so too do we support the right of Americans to travel freely, including travel to Cuba.”
   
• Oswaldo Payá, head of the Cuba Christian Liberation Movement, leader of the Cuban reform referendum drive known as the Varela Project and former Nobel Peace Prize nominee:  "As Cubans we do not accept that another country or group of countries impose its rules on the lives of our people, neither with unjust pressure nor economic isolation, be they embargos, sanctions or other types of measures."

To read who else supports reforming U.S. policy towards Cuba, click here.